Tage Frid passing
Murray in Palo Alto CA
>from the porch:
MIDDLETOWN -- Tage P. Frid, 88, of 303 Valley Rd., and formerly of Foster, a master woodworker, a professor emeritus at Rhode Island School of
Design, and a former school-committee chairman, died Tuesday at Village House, Newport.
A teacher and lecturer for 50 years, Mr. Frid had been a member of the faculty of the School for American Craftsmen, first at Alfred University and
later at the Rochester Institute of Technology before he became a professor and the head of the woodworking and design program at RISD in 1962. He retired from RISD, in the late 1980s, and was named a professor emeritus.
Still known as the "dean of American woodworking" at the time of his retirement, he is best recalled as a teacher of aspiring furniture designers and woodworkers.
His work was not limited to teaching, however, or even to woodworking. Mr. Frid had served as a consultant to the Mystic Seaport Museum, the International Mint and the former Rhode Island Hospital Trust bank, among others; as a designer of mass-produced for the Howard Johnson's and
Treadway motel chains; and as an interior designer to clients including the Danish government.
He had been a partner in Donovan and Frid, a design and woodworking firm specializing in interiors and handmade furniture. He was a co-founder of Shop One, in Rochester, N.Y., a shop owned and operated by craftsmen, and ESPAN, a manufacturer of small desk accessories.
Examples of his woodworking have showcased in many publications, and added to the permanent collections of the Smithsonian Institution, the Renwick Gallery, the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, and the Museum of Art at the Rhode Island School of Design.
His altars and crosses have been installed in many churches, among them, the Church of St. John the Divine-Episcopal, in Wickford Village, North Kingstown, and the Episcopal Church of Mitchell, S.D.
"When I've made it, I sell it," he said in a 1967 Sunday Journal interview. "Usually, after a very short time, I can't stand living with it." This philosophy drew the ire of his wife on at least one occasion, when during a luncheon party, the movers arrived to take away the dining room set.
Mr. Frid also was the author of a three-volume set entitled Tage Frid Teaches Woodworking, and had been a contributing editor, since 1975, to the
bimonthly trade journal Fine Woodworking.
His long and productive career drew him many awards. He was named a Fellow of the American Crafts Council, for his distinguished achievement, in 1980, and was the recipient of an honorary doctorate of fine arts from RISD, in
1984; the Governor's Award of the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts, in 1992; and in 2001, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Furniture
Society.
Mr. Frid completed his education as a journeyman in 1934, after a five-year apprenticeship under master craftsman Gronlund Jensen. He went on to graduate in 1940 from the Vedins School and to receive a degree in 1944 from the Graduate School for Interior Design, both in Copenhagen.
He was the husband of Emma Jacobsen; they had been married for 57 years. Born in Copenhagen, Denmark, the son of the late Albert Frid and Camilla Mortensen, he had lived in Denmark and Iceland before immigrating to this country in 1948.
Mr. Frid was a former member of the Foster School Committee, and had served as the board's chairman for several years.
Besides his wife, he leaves a daughter, Ann Randall of Middletown; a son, Peter Frid of Madbury, N.H.; and six grandsons.
A memorial service will be held at a later date. Burial will be private.
